How about something like an animate dream? Does it look different for each creature that sees it? Does it look the same? Does it change? It is "smart" enough to get psychic impressions from those its attacks?

Or is it a nightmare/dream that just stays the same? For example, Freddy Krueger from Nightmare on Elm Street could be an animate dream.

So there are monsters in the PF system/world that are indescribable, or whose descriptions are malleable. The one that comes to mind at the current moment, because i am writing an adventure with it in it, is the animate dream.

How would you describe something like that? And as a followup, what about other monsters that are similar? Ghosts are fairly easy, since they sort of depend on what there were like in life. But what about the oozes? Plants? Or elementals?

Or we could expand the subject to different ways to describe common creatures to confuse your players and keep them on their toes.

A band of river brigands called the Void Boys has built up a sizeable [sic] hideout in a network of hollow trees and caverns carved out amid their roots. Originally the band was little more than an upstart group of hoodlums who were too weak to make it on the streets of rugged Skelt, and fled the city for better pickings on the banks of the Shining River. But in the desolation of the Growling Skald, the gang discovered a strange carving of a woman screaming to the heavens, her arms bound to her sides by chains and her eye sockets empty. After the brigands carried the statue back to their hideout, it began to speak to them, and since then the renamed Void Boys have been an increasing threat to river traffic in the region. Some say they turn the dead of their victims against any survivors and that they have an army of undead waiting in the woods for a pending assault on Skelt itself.

Now, ignoring the bit about undead (because I don't want to go shooting of the track of the adventure too much, what would you think the "Void Boys" are?

I was thinking things like:

Void elementalist (Dragon Empires Primer)

Void bombs (Drow, alchemist 6)

void Kineticist

hungry ghost monk

Oni, Void Yai (bestiary 3)

But nothing it actually exciting me. Any suggestions from out in the, er, void?

So my group has talked me into running the Moonscar for them in two weeks. I am looking for expansions for the module -- like details on the Void Boys (and what might be going on there), if the fire giants, or the troglodytes. Basically anything that isn't detailed in the module.

Has anyone done anything they would like to share? Or point me in the right direction?

poisoned? diseased? making the saves? cursed? special wanna-die-can't-behealed-viking-power? or he just tells them he doesn't wish to live.

On the other hand: GMs and NPCs shouldn't always get their wishes, so if they save him against his will he can go off and commit seppuku later - or carry a nice grudge against the PCs - or get over it and become a farmer.

The way I see it:
You want NPC to die. Fine.
You force NPC death against PCs' healing attempts. Fine.
You let the PCs save NPC against his own wishes. Fine.
You push the players to play their PCs to "want" to let NPC die. Less fine.

Good point Don. I will just let it be. The NPC will tell the cleric (or whoever) "No, its too late for me, but i must tell you something...."

Say we, as game masters, are telling a story and in this story the PCs find a mortally wounded soldier. The soldier has information to give the PCs but in the story you (the game master) don't want the PCs to save the NPC, the NPC just wants to go on to Valhalla or where ever.

How would you present this to the players? Do you break the 4th wall and say your healing has no effect? Do you give the NPC a will save against the cure spells (for 1/2 healing)?

I'm not sure how to handle this situation in my mind's eye, or at the table.

The rule does not explicitly state that nothing can come between you and the stones in order for them to continue to function. There is nothing that says the don't work underwater. None of the above circumstances (with perhaps an argument for the stones getting tangled in the shrubbery as being equivalent to the stones being "netted") should separate them from their owner. The stone possibly smacks into the side of the door for a moment, so what?

While I normally agree with the issue with appeal to fun in a regular game where a GM can just make up their own rules to suit their desired level of verisimilitude, I reject the notion that it has no place in a shared world campaign like PFS. In fact it has always been my opinion that unless something is completely game-breaking or obviously contrary to the rules as written, then GMs should err on the side of player permissiveness when it comes to gray areas. (It doesn't have to be build specific either, the take 10/take 20 rules are often a point of contention that just irks me from time to time when GMs go out of their way to not allow it.)

In a home game where...

I actually agree with you 100% Michael. As my first post said, it was a house rule.

And also i find that argument superfluous, you might as well say I have 5000 gp to buy a thing-a-ma-jig, how about i just cross off that 5000 gp and you allow me to have the powers of the thing-a-ma-jig?

Incorporeal opponents? A massive spell blast that starts the encounter? ("Make a reflex save... before initiative?") Things with hardness (animate objects?) Things that are many and mobile (quicklings, jinxkin, ...)

Project Cadmus has always been a secretive Boogieman since its inception. Well, at least i think. i seem to remember Cadmus being good under the helm of Guardian and the pack of kids that were clones of scientists that worked there... or am i just confused... this was back in the 70s, early 80s.

In any case, the newest Supergirl was fan-tastic. Really looking forward to the crossover with CW's Flash nest week.

So I was excited to get this product. I love the OA classes and the psychic stuff. So to dive into this was a joy. Unfortunately several things came to my attentions immediately:

1) it uses rule/races/feats that aren't standard. While i can understand that , especially when trying to advance their own products, it makes it hard to transfer to a different campaign without executive decisions and educated guesswork.
2) uses rules from Ultimate Psionics
3) the stat blocks do not include all the possibilities for a given character. For example, a character that has kinetic blast doesn't have that ability in its stat block
4) the characters aren't very different from one another. For example, almost every single character have Weapon Focus (kinectic blast)
5) the color/info text doesn't match the stat block at times (electric instead of force)
6) each character has nearly the same feat/skill selection (see #4)
7) some characters have feats they do not qualify for
8) and some character have missing feats (ie. they should have x feats but only have x-1 feats in their stat block)

Now I do like the product. I love reading backstory and imaging what i can do with a given character. But i think this Kineticist Codex could have used a better editor and some more creative writer.

For Andoran, I opted for the "uncivilized" version, before or during the conquest of those lands by Taldor. So i used leather armor, spears, short bows, with heavy use of feathers as ornamentation. I also had the barbaric Andorans dye themselves primary colors (just because).

I was aiming, but probably not succeeding as i didn't research it, for barbaric Irish or Welsh warriors

BTW< the reason for these questions is my PCs are in Oppara, Taldor and want to visit the arena. So i did some research and found that many of the fights in the Roman Coliseum were "historical" demonstrating the "superiority" of the Romans over the foes they had conquered. Thus the need for a warrior that is instantly recognized as a culture or ethos.

Of course there will be performance combat as well. And fights with beasts. But man against man is always the "best"/most popular combats for the arena

Here's a quick legend for the numbers listed on the map of Oppara on p. 15. The information is incorporated into the location descriptions, but I feel it's useful to have it grouped for easy reference.

yay! now, just one question ... where's the house of the immortal son, now oppara's opera house? I was looking for it as I'm scheduled to run among the living and I just know that they're going to demand to tour the town

tyvm

I placed in in Seven Towers, for a couple of reasons:

1. Nothing else other than Senator-ian houses and the like are in that district
2. Its an older section of the city
3. It seemed like something the Senate would do (convert a temple into an opera house)

Why so many? I have surpassed my numbers from any previous competition. And I don't think I am even 250 votes yet...

If I had to guess I'd say that a lot of people missed the part about not straying from the PRD. Or maybe they thought their's was the exception. Or maybe they don't know that there is a difference between the PRD and the PFSRD.

I know I missed it with my first item. And then on my second item too. Thank goodness I had a proofreader. Thanks Mike!

I have a player who wants to play a clerical type but with alternative abilities. he basically wants to mix cleric with summoner. So he came up (with my suggestions) with this archetype. now i have burned myself before by not realizing the impact that seemingly innocuous things will cause on the life of the campaign. Could someone take a look and tell me what you think and, perhaps, some suggestions for improvements?

Additionally, without the training domain abilities, a divine caller loses access to any domains. This modifies the cleric's domain abilities.

Servant of the Devout: At 1st level, the Divine Caller gains the ability to summon to his side a powerful outsider called an eidolon. The eidolon forms a link with the divine caller, who, forever after, summons an aspect of the same creature. A Divine Caller’s eidolon must be of a type that serves her deity. It can speak all of the Divine Caller’s languages. Eidolons are treated as summoned creatures, except that they are not sent back to their home plane until reduced to a number of negative hit points equal to or greater than their Constitution score. In addition, due to its tie to its divine caller, an eidolon can touch and attack creatures warded by protection from evil and similar effects that prevent contact with summoned creatures. A divine caller can summon his eidolon in a ritual that takes 1 minute to perform. When summoned in this way, the eidolon hit points are unchanged from the last time it was summoned. The only exception to this is if the eidolon was slain, in which case it returns with half its normal hit points. The eidolon does not heal naturally. The eidolon remains until dismissed by the divine caller (a standard action). If the eidolon is sent back to its home plane due to death, it cannot be summoned again until the following day. The eidolon cannot be sent back to its home plane by means of dispel magic, but spells such as dismissal and banishment work normally. If the divine caller is unconscious, asleep, or killed, his eidolon is immediately banished. The eidolon takes a form shaped by the divine caller’s desires. The eidolon’s Hit Dice, saving throws, skills, feats, and abilities are tied to the divine caller’s class level and increase as the divine caller gains levels. In addition, each eidolon receives a pool of evolution points, based on the divine caller’s class level, that can be used to give the eidolon different abilities and powers. Whenever the divine caller gains a level, he must decide how these points are spent, and they are set until he gains another level of divine caller. The eidolon’s physical appearance is up to the divine caller, but it always appears as some sort of fantastical creature. This control is not fine enough to make the eidolon appear like a specific creature. The eidolon also bears a glowing rune that is identical to a rune that appears on the divine caller’s forehead as long as the eidolon is summoned. While this rune can be hidden through mundane means, it cannot be concealed through magic that changes appearance, such as alter self or polymorph (although invisibility does conceal it as long as the spell lasts).

Summon Divine Ally: Starting at 1st level, a summoner can cast summon monster I as a spell-like ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + his Wisdom modifier. The divine caller can use this ability only to summon monsters particularly appropriate to her deity. This includes creatures whose alignment is within one step of her deity, or creatures of an elemental subtype that matches a domain granted by her deity. Drawing upon this ability uses up the same power as the summoner uses to call his eidolon. As a result, he can only use this ability when his eidolon is not summoned. He can cast this spell as a standard action and the creatures remain for 1 minute per level (instead of 1 round per level). At 3rd level, and every 2 levels thereafter, the power of this ability increases by one spell level, allowing him to summon more powerful creatures (to a maximum of summon monster IX at 17th level). A summoner cannot have more than one summon monster spell active in this way at one time. If this ability is used again, any existing summon monster immediately ends. These summon spells are considered to be part of his spell list for the purposes of spell trigger and spell completion items. In addition, he can expend uses of this ability to fulfill the construction requirements of any magic item she creates, so long as she can use this ability to cast the required spell.

Channel Link: At 2nd level, whenever the divine caller uses channel energy to heal, she can include all of her summoned monsters and/or her eidolon, even if they are out of her normal channel energy radius, or if it is a creature type that would not normally be affected.

Mighty Divine Ally: At 4th level, a divine caller receives Augment Summoning as a bonus feat, and is considered to have Spell Focus(conjuration) for the purposes of prerequisites for feats that have Augment Summoning as a prerequisite. At 8th level, she gains Superior Summoning as a bonus feat.

Transform Calling: At 6th level, whenever the divine caller has her eidolon active, she may use her Summon Monster spell-like ability to temporarily replace her eidolon with the monster she chose to summon. This monster appears in the same square that the eidolon occupied or in the nearest open space that will accommodate the creature or creatures. She may recall her eidolon by expending another use of Summon Monster or by waiting for the spell to expire. If the summoned monster is returned to it’s home plane for any reason beside those listed above, her eidolon can only be summoned back by the standard ritual.

Divine Legion: At 10th level, a Divine Caller can use her summon monster spell-like ability even if her eidolon or another summon is already active. Using this ability expends three uses of her summon monster ability.

Summoning Surge: At 12th level, by expending a use of the divine caller’s Summon Monster spell like ability, she can infuse her eidolon with any evolution whose total cost does not exceed 2 evolution points. You may only grant one evolution, however you can grant evolutions that allow her to spend additional points to upgrade that evolution. This power cannot be used to upgrade a power the eidolon already possesses. The eidolon must meet the prerequisites of any selected evolution. This ability does not allow an eidolon to exceed it’s maximum number of natural attacks. At 14th level, this ability can infuse up to 4 points of evolutions to her eidolon and 2 points to a summoned creature. At 16th level, this ability can infuse up to 6 points of evolutions to her eidolon and 4 points to a summoned creature. This effect lasts for 1 minute per Divine Caller level.

Divine Intervention: At 20th level, once per day, the divine caller may call a servant of her deity as if using one of the following spells: Lesser Planar Ally, Planar Ally, Greater Planar Ally, or Gate. The divine caller must pay any material component costs, but most creatures summoned will forego any additional payments (and the negotiations that go with it) for simple tasks, and much reduced payments for longer or particularly dangerous tasks.

So I am constructing a murder mystery urban adventure. And considering using a stalker vigilante as the murderer. I want a very Jack the Ripper feel to this bad guy. So far I have this in my head (BTW, my home campaign is called the Wounded World):

Wounded World spoiler:

The bad guy is a minor nobleman in Taldor, home city called Zaragoza, on the border between Taldor and Qadira. He is also a guard captain in the city's guard. His position makes him travel quite a bit, both for work and for familial obligations. So when he is on these trips, he has committed his horrendous and murderous acts. That is how the PCs stumble on to him and now they are tracking him back to his home city.

We had the same discussion about portable holes in my game Saturday. I asserted that you couldn't set up an alchemical laboratory in a a portable hole, the fold up the hole, carry it with you, and then unfold the hole to find the laboratory still stable and intact -- i though the contents would rattle around.

My players disagreed.

Since it was completely off topic in game, we really didn't come to a conclusion.

That being said...

its a move action to pull anything out of a handy haversack, so one assumes that the the space inside is nebulous and its the mental command of the wearer that "pulls" the desired object to the hand reaching in for it. So its a big space that sort of floats there. At least that's my idea.

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You can always remove the the advanced template. and leave the show stuff.

Calculating the CR/EL of an encounter is more an art form than an exact science unfortunately.

Alternatively you could grant it 20% concealment and tell the players that it has misleading shadows writhing and twisting around it misleading you into where to strike. I would up the CR on a spider with that ability by 1.

Let me ask this, what is the most devastating attack the PCs have? What is it that makes your encounters not challenging? Can you approach the mechanics of the encounter in order to minimize that?

For example say it was a barbarian with a two-handed sword that was cutting things to pieces. But him in cramped quarters or where he has to squeeze and that 2-hand sword gets taken out of play.

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Do you want it to "be by the rules" (add a HD, apply a template, etc.) or can you be more ad hoc (give it a higher AC, more hit points, increase the damage it deals, give it some form if special attack, etc.)

After all the PCs don't see your notes. If you have a owlbear for example, describe it differently. Instead of

An amalgam of fur and feathers, this bizarre half-bear, half-owl monstrosity raises its huge, ursine claws in anger.

say

the hulking creature is silent as it stalks towards you. It rises up on its hind legs, unsheathing saber like claws that are colored a sickly yellow. Its beak snaps open and close as if it is a pair of axe blades coming together with finality.

Then i would increase the damage the owlbear does from 2 claws +8 (1d6+4 plus grab), bite +8 (1d6+4) to 2 claws +10 (increaing its strength appropriately) (1d8+6 plus grab), bite +10 (1d8+8). And if i really wanted to add challenge, make the claws pouisonous of disease ridden.

I did have one minor disappointment: Klarkosh is supposed to be "an initiate of Numeria's Technic League," but has very little "technological" flavor other than crafting automatons.

So I modified his stat block to give him a more "Numerian" feel, using the Technology Guide (TG) and some alternate spells from Advanced Player's Guide (APG), Ultimate Magic (UM), and Ultimate Combat (UC). If anyone else wants to use it, see below:

I compromised. The Hellknights asked for one share of whatever loot the party brings out as well as access to anything they deemed "too dangerous for the general populace." Additionally the Hellknight insisted on rights to first buy anything that they could use -- specifically masterwork weapons and armor.

Remember the Hellknights are, as a general rule, LN tending towards E. They aren't there to make the PCs miserable. They are there to provide a bastion of civilization, law and order, in the middle of a wilderness. The HK know that the PCs adventuring in the area might make things more chaotic for a while, but eventually the PCs will move on and then the HK can keep control.

Additionally, having the PCs in town makes it easier for the HK to keep an eye on the adventurers.

If the PCs decide to camp away from town, let 'em. The HK won't care as long as they don't do anything that compromise their laws. Of course, since Fort Inevitable is the closest market, the PCs may be dealing with lengthy over land travel that are not patrolled by the HK.

Remember the HK will only be adversaries to the party if the party *wants* them to be adversaries. They have the choice to make the enemy. the Hellknights will react appropriately.

where they fought all the low-level mooks in the main part of the complex. They did a fairly efficient job, keeping them from sounding the alarm. So they look around and proceed to search every room... until they hit the gibbering mouther. Which ended the life of our brave tiefling paladin/bloodrager...

With that, the group decided to head out, get their companion raises/reincarnated/whatever they could..

That being said, Splinterden is being left alone for a good 4-5 days. Being a living level, i know that the NPCs are going to take action, but i am not sure what. Any ideas? How would the bandits reinforce their hideout? Or would they take off?

Spoiler:

I thought about redoing the synesthesia gas trap with something nastier, but that might be a bit too much, especially considering the bandits live there!

Think it possible that the bandits could recruit more mooks? Or hire a specialist to watch for adventurers (medium level mage or someone/thing that specializes in dealing with groups?

Spoiler:

Maybe a ratling/ratfolk mage who has charmed or made friends with an otyugh?
Or a small group of Wolfmane mercenaries?
Maybe they pay a bonus to Klarkosh to get some constructs/automatons for guards?
They might even make a deal with a moon spider on the level above?

I have thrown together a document with runes I have culled from elsewhere in the webs. This document has the graphic of the Emerald Spire's level runes, and a list of places it can be found within the Emerald Spire (hopefully I haven't missed a reference).

Here's my concern for the second level of the Spire: more darkness effects. Granted, much of the floor is easy to see with a torch. However, there's one big problem.

/snip/

I ran the top two levels of the dungeon at a convention this past weekend.

I concur almost entirely with the Sword Emperor's critique of the tower ruins and the level underneath. The darkness effect in the castle itself was frustrating for the party. The same with the obscuring mist.

But, thinking back, I may have been playing the darkness effect in the tower ruins incorrectly. The party encountered the ruins during the day, and I'm not sure how much sunlight would normally get through the green glass ceilings. It's plausible that the ambient lighting of the place would be dim light. So, concealment for the goblins running around in the twilit rooms and corridors, but not total concealment.

/snip/

Unfortunately, IIRC, the darkness effects on the 1st level are always on. The goblins aren't affected since they have darkvision.

When I run this, I plan on modifying the light levels on level 1 so that it will never get brighter than dim light. That way even the non-darkvision and non-low-light PCs will still be effective.